The Moon and the stars — March 2028

Lunar occultations of stars to magnitude 9.5, computed for your location

Every night the Moon slides in front of stars. A star doesn't fade behind it — it switches off, then switches back on at the other edge, often an hour later. Pick your place and what you observe with; the list keeps what you can realistically see.

Naked eye Binoculars Small telescope (80 mm) Telescope (200 mm)

39 occultations you can see from New Delhi with small telescope (80 mm) this month, on 13 nights · 1175 in all from there

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Fri

Sat

Sun

3 5

2 6

2 11

1 12

4 16

3 17

4 18

1 19

1 20

Times in IST. A night runs from noon to noon, so an event at 01:30 stays with the evening before. On each Moon, the numbered marks show where on the limb each star disappears or reappears.

Night of Sat 4 Mar

1
20:13:00 HIP 23349 V 7.5
Disappears at the dark limb
68° up in the W · dark sky · PA 33° · cusp 39°
2
22:53:44 HIP 23712 V 6.6
Disappears at the dark limb · reappears 23:02:56 at the dark limb
34° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 17° · cusp 22°
3
23:40:00 HIP 23884 V 7.6
Disappears at the dark limb
24° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 37° · cusp 42°

Night of Sun 5 Mar

1
23:19:29 TYC 1881-187-1 V 7.6
Disappears at the dark limb
40° up in the W · dark sky · PA 97° · cusp 84°
2
02:10:36 HIP 29702 V 7.3
Disappears at the dark limb
6° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 72° · cusp 70°

Night of Mon 6 Mar

1
19:36:56 ω Gem V 5.2
Reappears at the bright limb
78° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 301° · cusp 66°

Night of Fri 10 Mar

1
00:31:22 HIP 54260 V 7.0
Disappears at the dark limb
62° up in the S · dark sky · PA 127° · cusp 26°
2
05:14:36 69 Leo V 5.4
Disappears at the dark limb
14° up in the W · dark sky · PA 111° · cusp 19°

Night of Sat 11 Mar

1
22:48:16 HIP 58268 V 6.7
Reappears at the dark limb
44° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 306° · cusp 78°

Night of Sun 12 Mar

1
00:14:04 HR 4901 V 6.0
Reappears at the dark limb
43° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 297° · cusp 83°
2
02:08:30 HIP 63220 V 6.4
Reappears at the dark limb
49° up in the S · dark sky · PA 318° · cusp 76°

Night of Wed 15 Mar

1
00:10:31 TYC 6781-720-1 V 7.5
Reappears at the dark limb
7° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 313° · cusp 62°
2
01:29:13 Gaia …2716544 V 7.2
Reappears at the dark limb
20° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 250° · cusp 55°
3
03:35:11 2 Sco V 4.7
Disappears at the bright limb · reappears 04:45:49 at the dark limb
34° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 68° · cusp 54°
4
04:45:46 TYC 6782-2147-2 V 7.1
Reappears at the dark limb
36° up in the S · dark sky · PA 326° · cusp 48°

Night of Thu 16 Mar

1
01:16:23 HIP 82069 V 7.0
Reappears at the dark limb
8° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 271° · cusp 83°
2
03:39:10 HIP 82397 V 7.5
Reappears at the dark limb
28° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 306° · cusp 62°
3
04:52:11 HIP 82512 V 7.5
Reappears at the dark limb
33° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 292° · cusp 76°

Night of Fri 17 Mar

1
02:50:52 HIP 86949 V 7.4
Reappears at the dark limb
14° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 243° · cusp 62°
2
04:23:24 HR 6621 V 6.3
Reappears at the dark limb
27° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 256° · cusp 75°
3
05:26:49 Gaia …3206656 V 8.0
Reappears at the dark limb
32° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 296° · cusp 65°
4
05:34:34 HIP 87306 V 7.0
Reappears at the dark limb
33° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 236° · cusp 55°

Night of Sat 18 Mar

1
04:58:05 HIP 91962 V 8.4
Reappears at the dark limb
26° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 310° · cusp 45°

Night of Sun 19 Mar

1
03:47:21 TYC 6889-612-1 V 8.0
Reappears at the dark limb
9° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 193° · cusp 23°

Night of Mon 20 Mar

1
04:11:37 Gaia …6087680 V 6.8
Reappears at the dark limb
7° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 316° · cusp 30°

Night of Thu 30 Mar

1
19:21:06 Electra (17 Tau) V 3.7
Reappears at the bright limb
40° up in the W · dusk · PA 247° · cusp 84°
2
19:31:33 TYC 1800-1607-1 V 8.3
Disappears at the dark limb
37° up in the W · dark sky · PA 107° · cusp 56°
3
19:33:42 TYC 1800-2201-1 V 6.3
Disappears at the dark limb
37° up in the W · dark sky · PA 113° · cusp 51°
4
19:36:44 HIP 17704 V 6.8
Disappears at the dark limb
36° up in the W · dark sky · PA 74° · cusp 90°
5
19:38:50 Alcyone (η Tau) V 2.8
Disappears at the dark limb · reappears 20:39:51 at the bright limb
36° up in the W · dark sky · PA 116° · cusp 48°
6
19:39:54 TYC 1800-1579-1 V 8.4
Disappears at the dark limb
36° up in the W · dark sky · PA 150° · cusp 14°
7
20:01:06 Gaia …5088128 V 8.3
Disappears at the dark limb
31° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 68° · cusp 84°
8
20:11:06 TYC 1800-1601-1 V 7.0
Disappears at the dark limb
29° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 62° · cusp 78°
9
20:29:44 Pleione (28 Tau) V 5.2
Disappears at the dark limb · reappears 21:28:06 at the bright limb
25° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 110° · cusp 54°
10
20:34:53 TYC 1800-901-1 V 8.0
Disappears at the dark limb
24° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 86° · cusp 79°
11
20:35:36 Atlas (27 Tau) V 3.6
Disappears at the dark limb · reappears 21:21:20 at the bright limb
24° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 133° · cusp 32°
12
20:38:15 TYC 1804-265-1 V 7.5
Disappears at the dark limb
24° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 49° · cusp 65°
13
20:39:05 HIP 17862 V 6.6
Disappears at the dark limb
23° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 54° · cusp 70°
14
20:53:00 TYC 1800-985-1 V 7.6
Disappears at the dark limb
21° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 62° · cusp 78°

Reading the list

The Moons are drawn from LRO LOLA topography (a 40 KB relief map), lit by the Sun as it is at that moment and turned to the Moon's real libration: north up, east to the left. A dark-limb event — the star vanishing into, or popping out of, the unlit edge of the Moon — is easy to see. At the bright limb only bright stars show against the glare. PA is where on the limb it happens, measured from north through east; the cusp angle is the distance from the nearest horn of the crescent. graze marks a star passing within 3″ of the edge from your place: a few kilometres from a graze line, where it may blink several times behind mountains.

Instrument	dark limb	bright limb
Naked eye	V ≤ 3.0	V ≤ 1.0
Binoculars	V ≤ 6.5	V ≤ 3.5
Small telescope (80 mm)	V ≤ 8.5	V ≤ 5.5
Telescope (200 mm)	V ≤ 9.5	V ≤ 7.0

Those limits are rules of thumb: the dark-limb limit drops by 2.5 magnitudes × (lit fraction − 0.4) in moonglare and by 1 in twilight; events with the Moon under 5° are left out, and daylight events except for the brightest stars. Stars are from Gaia DR3 to G 9.5, with Hipparcos-2 for the brightest and the Yale Bright Star Catalogue for names; the Moon is from the JPL DE431 ephemeris. Times are for the Moon's mean limb, ±2 s — mountains at the edge can move a contact by a few seconds, and much more near a graze.